Google shared drives change, features and tips

The University has recently changed how we create new Google shared drives. UMN employees must now use a request form on the UMN Shared Drives website that will:

• Auto-generate a shared drive file name using information you provide
• Collect owners' contact information
• Collect information about the drive’s purpose

Existing shared drives will remain untouched and owners are encouraged to rename them using the new shared drive naming format drivename-MNEXT-department (e.g. Advisory_Team-MNEXT-ELT)

Why the change?

This change is part of the University’s Sustainable Storage program to ensure that the University uses industry-standard, sustainable storage practices. If a shared drive is abandoned, its content adds to the University’s total amount of data stored - potentially adding to costs - even though the files are no longer needed. Our existing shared drives do not provide UMN Google administrators with information about the purpose of the files within shared drives or who should be contacted to make a decision about retention. The information collected in the new request form will enable UMN IT to follow up with owners as needed to ensure shared drives should be retained.

What are Google shared drives?

Google shared drives is a space where teams can store, search and access files from anywhere, any device. With shared drives, documents are owned by all of the members instead of one person. When someone leaves the group, their files remain in the shared drive without having to transfer ownership.

Shared Drives Features

Files and folders persist after someone leaves

Members of the shared drive own the files, not an individual. When someone leaves and their account is removed, files they added or created remain in the drive. The person leaving does not have to transfer ownership of files that are in the shared drive.

Easy sharing for members

All members of a shared drive see the same content so members can just add files to the drive without having to share them. Shared drive managers can add individuals or a Google Group as members of the shared drive. Managers assign members access levels which control what they can do with files and the shared drive.

Sharing files and folders with non-members

Members of the drive can share individual files and folders with non-members. You can give them view, comment or edit access to files. This option lets you share only what a non-member needs access to, without sharing everything in the drive.

External people can be a member of your shared drive

You can add external people to a shared drive as long as they have an email associated with a Google account.

Tips for shared drives

• If the shared drive is an active space for collaboration, give members Content manager access or Contributor access so they aren’t limited in how they work together in the shared drive.
• If it is too difficult to organize, there may be too many projects and teams using the shared drive. You might reorganize the shared drive into 2–3 new ones:
• One shared drive that contains the “shared” content, representing a cross-functional project team
• One (or more) shared drives for the specific content for each of the functional teams
• Use separate shared drives to control access as needed. You might want to have more than one shared drive for the same project if you have distinct groups of collaborators with different access needs.

Hide shared drives

Over time, you might be added to several shared drives. You can hide a shared drive that’s part of a completed project or maybe you don’t access it often. Just right-click on the shared drive and select Hide shared drive

If you hide a shared drive, you still have access to it and your permissions don’t change. You can unhide a shared drive at any time.